Backup Strategy

All photos on an internal mirrored RAID 1 (two hard drives, same data)
This is backed up via a back up program "SyncBack" to an external RAID 1 mirrored array (now my photos are on 4 hard drives)
SyncToy is very similar to SyncBack by the way.

This all gets backed up again to a portable hard drive for off sight storage in my office at work. This gets swapped out every 6 months or so, or after any significant photo shoot. The delay also means if I manage to hose both copies at home somehow,.. copy the mistake as it were, then I have some leeway with the off site version to get it back.

In all of these steps I do not use any compression, or archive files. It's all active useable copies as is.

bps wrote in post #16850086
If you want (or require) a robust solution, then there are a lot of options out there for a RAID setup with multiple drives. If you invest in that route though, you really need to buy server-grade hard drives that are built to last since the drive will be operating 24/7. Also, even if you invest in a RAID system, you still need to have an off-site solution to protect yourself in the event of theft, fire, natural disaster, etc.

Bryan

That RAID is still just from a backup perspective the same as a rather large USB disk.

A single file overwrite will give the same result.
A single format will give the same result.
A single virus damaging all files accessible will give the same result.
A lightning strike frying the power supply can give the same result.
A trashed file system after a power failure can give the same result.

By the way - you don't need enterprise-level disks since most users will not have the disks rattling with load. Most people will not even keep the disks spinning 24x7 since a good home NAS solution would stop the disks when there isn't any accesses to fulfill.

But it can be smart to buy one of the "home-NAS" type of disks available from both WD and Seagate. They have firmware better suited for NAS use, and normally a better warranty.

When it comes to backup, people really should use backup software and not just copy files. The main difference with a backup software is that it stores generations of files. So if a file is changed, the next backup will not overwrite the original file on the backup media, but will instead store both the original file and the modified file. This gives time to realize if a file has been accidentally modified and allows the original file to be restored.

So in the end, it's important to separate the data into two sets.
- Living data that requires real backup software.
- Static data that can be copied (archived) and where the archived media can then be taken permanently off-line with no more write accesses needed.

A good backup solution should then also be able to
- validate the backups
- warn if any of the static data for some reason has been changed (on the computer or on the archive media).

I have tried different backup software over the years. Some good, some poor. Today I avoid any backup software that zips or stores the backup in proprietary file.

Now I only backp import or volatile data. I backup my images to an external HDD using "alwaysync", it is free and easy to use. Most important I can see where the data goes and I know I can get it back. I do this as a manual routine, approx once a month, or if I do a lot of images. I could automate this, but I choose not to. The worst case is I loose about a month of adjustments, I can live with that. The external drive is unplugged when I am not backing up.

I also have a 3TB WD my cloud, I run the WD backup software automatically in the background for all my personal volatile data except for images and video. I can see me making more use of this in the future.

Freefilesync is my favorite folder syncing program. Way faster than ms synctoy and has more features.

Here is a backup guide I made: http://www.overclock.n​et …4/seans-data-backup-guide

For backup I usually do a sync of my picture folder to my server every night. Then a sync to my external ones a week or two. Then a sync to another external and RAID 6 array on my server once a month.

I have a Mac with all my photos on one external hard drive. I then use Time Machine to backup to another external hard drive, and Crashplan to backup to the cloud.